I posted this on another thread, but is also worth highlighting here what was said by Ben Manga in the summer.
We have a significant amount of idiots in the fanbase. Perfect club for the likes of Pozzo and Duxbury.
All the players he recommended were probably The “wrong fit “ “Too much money “ “Didn’t want to come .
He asked to leave Frankfurt so he could ‘take a new path’ and then joined us less than a month later, so we presumably approached him (rather than him applying for the role?) Would be bizarre but not surprising to do that, double his salary and then just not back him. He supposedly shaped Frankfurt’s scouting network over a period of years, so maybe that’s more his remit than purely buying players in the here and now. If he ends up leaving in the near future then it will be utter farce yet again from the club.
Gino Pozzo employing Ben Manga to be in charge of recruitment is probably the most pointless business decision made since Wernham Hogg's David Brent brought in Rowan to run a training day for his staff and then took control of it himself. Almost a shame Manga didn't enquire about Mason Greenwood, as Pozzo could have just said "I think there's been a rape up there" in order to 'win'.
Didnt Manga say he has a five year plan recently? Whether he will a. be allowed to implement his plan (and not mislead in joining us) and b. actually end up being here for that long remains to be seen.
If we lose at Coventry tomorrow despite another good performance, I can assume Gino will be drafting his P45 and getting his little book out to see who is next in charge. I say this in jest, as he'll probably get ten games to get us going. But three losses in a row, and if we fail to score again...
Not quite, although the 'everything is going just fine' brigade have interpreted it as him saying that it'll take five years to get back into the Premier League: At Watford FC, I am the sports manager who pursues a clear goal: promotion to the Premier League. This is a challenge that we will tackle together as a team. We deliberately signed a five-year contract to achieve our goals. The Premier League is the biggest league in the world, it is a personal incentive to lead a club there as a sports manager.
Failed to get rid of Kalu, a player the head coach doesn't want to use. Surely can't have been that difficult to shift him on loan somewhere.
Hard finding somewhere with the homely feel he's always valued but also a warden on site 24/7 and those orange pull cord alarms in every room.
So two windows in and these are the players Manga has brought in (excluding Koné and Martins as those deals seemed teed up before he officially joined). Araujo Ferreira Assombalonga Porteous Hoedt Ince Livermore Chakvetadze Lewis Healey Rajovic Interesting that two of the signings most people would say are amongst the better ones are probably Bayat suggestions (Hoedt and Chakvetadze). The player we spent the most on has been sent to Udinese. Jury still out on Manga in my opinion.
Ultimately who is responsible for a failure to score given our lion's share of possession plus many attempts at goal ? . Managers have been moved on because we haven't won and the team looked shocking however we look a decent side without a cutting edge. Who should take the rap for an inadequate strike force?. In my view we could have Pep as boss, Klopp as his number 2 and Arteta and Poch as coaches but if the strikers can't hit a barn door then results won't change
How dare you! I have it on good authority that he spent extensive time scouting Matheus Martins - who was playing for some no-name club last season - and he looks like a great pick-up!
We can still pick up out of contract players, still time for Manga to pull an Nkoulou out of the bag.
If we sign him up now he’ll be ready to play by November, and we’ll get at least a game out of him until before fireworks night.
Definitely not convincing so far . We’re looking for a few gems that will develop into great players while they are here . Chakvetadze .. maybe though not convinced so far Rajovic … hopefully Can’t think of anyone else so far .I’m not counting any of the players we would have been aware of already . Jao fereira will presumably make his way back to Watford at some point . I suppose if we get 2 or 3 in each transfer window we could build a decent side but that’s assuming a medium /long term view . We may have missed out on some because we couldn’t afford them which I guess isn’t Manga’s fault but then it’s gonna be a struggle in that case.
I don’t think we can include Chakvetadze as he’s just on loan. There is an option on him, but I doubt we’d invoke that as we apparently have no money. The thing with Manga, is we don’t know how many players he identified. He could have found many “gems” but Gino said no to the lot. So I think Manga is excused for now, but I will take a keen interest on whether he’s happy or whether he’s being blocked and overruled. Certainly, from the work we’ve done in this window, we’ve not needed him or Costa, Tonello etc. The focus during this window was clearly on Udinese, so I fully expect to find out he did a lot of work over there. They made 16 incoming signings.
Exactly this. Which begs the question, why hire any of these people when the club are clearly broke? Can't be cheap paying their wages...
Our spend on the wages for the hierarchy is more than the money we spent on incoming transfers. Let that sink in. I think it’s a valid question to ask whether these people exclusively work for Watford or do they work for both clubs. With the salaries we’re spending on Duxbury, Giaretta, Manga, Costa, Tonello and all the talent scouts across the globe, it far outweighs the need of a struggling Championship club, which is what we are now make no mistake in that. So why do Watford have a management structure on the budget of a mid-table Premier League club? It makes no sense.
Yes or even investing in a Category One academy, if we’re truly wanting to go down the route of using our youth for the first team. I think the evidence is more and more pointing to we’re being used for the benefit of Udinese, with little uplift to us into the bargain. We’re hurting now and that’s down to the ownership. His decisions has placed us where we are now. A threadbare squad, large debt, no money but the guys at the top are milking fantastic salaries. It’s utterly obscene.
Udinese is and will always be Gino's baby. Full effort and commitment will be go there. Watford are like an unwanted lodger who is invading his personal living space. He doesn't care what happens to us, as long as his other investment is safe and secure. That may sound harsh. but it's just how I view him now.
I don't get the argument that we are being used for the benefit of Udinese and that's where there the full effort and commitment goes. I think we've historically got more out of them than they out of us. And even if it were true, us being successful would generate more income than Udinese being successful which would mean more resources could be diverted to Udinese. Besides it hardly looks like the Udinese first team are being lavished with great players . It seems both clubs are in the doldrums.
I don't think they are particularly special or good but seem to always just about do enough to stay up with a mixture of our ex players and for example someone with quality like the lad Everton have got. Difference is we did get good players who made a positive impact early on but seem to have got less and less quality over the years as proven by our recent seasons! I got the impression their fans have never been that happy with the Pozzos but probably like with us weren't able to do much.
With the greatest of respect I would say it’s irrelevant what the arrangement with Udinese was in the past. The directional arrow is firmly pointing towards Italy right now. Watford deserve better than this. We are a club in our own right, not a subset to Udinese. But I agree. Even though Udinese are the favoured club, they are in the doldrums also. This is why the Pozzo’s need to sell up and get out before the damage they are causing is irreversible.
